The Borderlands line
A Brief History of the line
The railway line which today links Wrexham, the largest town in North Wales, with Deeside and Merseyside has a long and intricate history. Its origins lie in the growth of the North Wales coalfield, the Buckley brick and tile industry, John Summers & Sons and the expansion of the Great Central Railway. Its function nowadays is to provide a local passenger service to the towns and villages of North East Wales and the Wirral and to supply the heavy industry of Deeside with raw materials.
The Buckley area had a long history of using narrow gauge tramways to connect the various brick and tile works with adjacent collieries. Some of these early lines were extended as far as the River Dee to export the finished product. The first standard gauge railway in the area was the Buckley Railway which was opened in 1862. This ran steeply down from Buckley to Connahs Quay. There it ran onto the docks and to a connection with the London and North Western Railway.
A
Bidston service at Penyffordd station.
At about this
time, industrialists in the Wrexham area were seeking to build a line northwards
as an alternative to the GWR. The Wrexham Mold and Connahs Quay Railway
was duly authorised to build a line from Wrexham to a connection with the
Buckley Railway. In due course they agreed to take over the working
of the Buckley Railway. The WM&CQ main line duly opened
in 1866 as a single track. Its original terminus at Wrexham was adjacent
to the GWR station (later to become Wrexham Exchange). A passenger
service commenced between Wrexham and Buckley but the section beyond, down
to Connahs Quay, remained freight only until closure. A period of
steady expansion and consolidation followed although at no time could the
WM&CQ be described as prosperous.
In the 1880's matters elsewhere were about to have a decisive impact on the future of the railway. The expansionist Manchester Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway, later to become the Great Central, was keen to tap the traffic of the area. Accordingly it obtained an Act to build a railway from Chester Northgate to Shotton including the bridge over the Dee. To link with this line, the WM&CQ commenced construction of a new line from near Buckley to Shotton. At the same time it doubled its existing line. The result was a double tracked line from Wrexham to Shotton and beyond which today forms the basis of the present service. The Hawarden loop as it was known was opened in 1890.
37607
leads the Serco test train at Hawarden on the 5th September 2006, 37611
was on the rear.
On the other
side of the Dee, a 15 mile line was built from Dee Marsh to Seacombe Ferry
via Bidston and opened to passenger and freight traffic in 1896.
In 1897 the WM&CQ railway ceased to exist and was merged into the Great
Central Railway. The GCR was amalgamated into the London and North
Eastern Railway in 1923 and the line to Wrexham became its only outpost
in Wales. British Railways took over in 1948 and nowadays under privatisation
the service is operated by Arriva Trains Wales.
Network
Rail track inspection train at Hawarden Bridge.
The passenger
service on the completed system was operated on a triangular basis.
Services ran from Wrexham to Chester Northgate and Seacombe; Seacombe to
Wrexham and Chester; and Chester to Seacombe and Wrexham. This pattern
continued over many years using a succession of small tank locomotives.
Dieselisation of passenger services, using Class 108 units, occurred in
the late fifties and Seacombe ferry station was closed, services being
diverted to run to New Brighton.
Following closure of Chester Northgate in 1969, the train service was reduced to the Wrexham - Bidston service which exists unchanged today, although for a brief period in the 1970's services were extended to Birkenhead North.
The line has always been busy with freight traffic. Coal was a staple traffic along with brick and tile products from the ex Buckley Railway. During LNER days a considerable trade developed in exports and imports via Birkenhead Docks, served by a marshalling yard at Bidston, most of this traffic originating from Manchester and Yorkshire. From the 1920's steel making at Shotton came to dominate freight movements. Trainloads of iron ore, coal and limestone were balanced by a healthy trade outwards of finished steel products. The busiest days were in the 1950's when new docks were built at Bidston specifically to supply iron ore to the works. Following the ending of steel making, the works were reduced to a shadow of their former self and concentrated on the coating of steel coils, in the process becoming the largest works of its kind in Europe.
This
bus service meets certain trains at Buckley station.
Freight traffic
has now settled into a pattern of up to three block trains a day from South
Wales of steel coils and an occasional trip working from Warrington for
any other traffic. Trainloads of imported coal also run to Castle
Cement at Penyffordd up to twice a week
To
research the full story of the Buckley Railway, the early tramways and
the WM&CQR, an excellent reference work is The Wrexham Mold and Connahs
Quay Railway by James Boyd.
Next page: The view from the train